


The Kindness of Strangers

by thefilthiestpiglet



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Guro, HYDRA Trash Party, Happy Ending, Pre-Captain America: The Winter Soldier
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-04
Updated: 2016-08-09
Packaged: 2018-07-29 07:02:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,435
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7674715
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thefilthiestpiglet/pseuds/thefilthiestpiglet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For <a href="http://hydratrashmeme.dreamwidth.org/1634.html?thread=4530018#cmt4530018">a prompt on the trashmeme</a> that requested: Pre-CATWS, HYDRA nabs Steve and have their way with him, with plans to get rid of him for good.  But instead they give him to the Winter Soldier as a sort of fluffy teddy bear.</p><p>(Basically I read the "WS with fluffy teddy bear" part and said "yes please")</p><p>Relevant picture as usual.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

"He looks dead." And Steve felt dead. They'd blinded him early on, and all his limbs flop uselessly where they'd broken bones or tore up tendons. He'd long since stopped counting the number of bleeding wounds, and his breath is coming in slow and shallow. But he could afford an internal chuckle: at least both his ears worked, which means this is still farther from death than December 1932. Though just by a hair.

"Well, not quite, but getting close... I'd say 2 hours tops at this rate." Ah yes, that's the voice of the guy who decided he wanted to fuck Captain America's guts, and had enough medical training to slice open his belly without harming the intestines. Sicko.

"I ... I guess we should finish him off now?" Someone reached over to try to pick him up. It's the young kid who quickly shed his wide-eyed stare for a chance at shocking his balls with a cattle prod. "Oof, he's heavy as fuck." Damn right, 200 lbs of dead weight. Hah. Dead.

The sound of the door opening and closing. Steve couldn't hear anyone step in, but they must have, since the room was suddenly a jumble of voices.

"Oh hey, Asset, c'mere and help. Gotta toss him out." He felt strong arms pick him up and hoist him over a cold, hard shoulder in a fireman's carry. The pain from being moved makes him miss the next bit.

"... somewhere to bleed out for the next 2 hours. Maybe we should have some display, show the world what happens when you defy..."

"... you know we can't blow our cover before the big day." Dammit, every time the kid gets close to saying which group they're with, the guy with the beard always cuts him off. Steve would really like revenge, right after he gets past the bleeding-out-and-dying part.

"Guys... look at how it's staring at him."

"Oh man, too bad we busted Cap's eyes, if he saw, that'd give him a heart attack and kill him right there." Steve was filled with sudden curiosity -- what was he not supposed to see? The man carrying him, the Asset, remained completely still.

"Hey, Asset, you want this corpse?" The kid again.

The beard guy slaps him. "Shut up, it's not supposed to want things." And then, probably a shrug? "Whatever. Here, the guy's yours. Enjoy."

The sounds of the sadists pulling their pants back on and heading for the door.

"Oh, and clean up the room."

And with that, they trooped out, and Steve was left with silence. The Asset. 

After a quick moment, he felt himself being put back down again. But this time, it was so gentle there was barely any pain. What was the Asset going to do to him? And why couldn't he hear the Asset's movements, even with his enhanced hearing?

He felt fingers pry at his mouth. Dammit, not again. He tries to clamp down, but the gut-fucker messed with his jaw, too. Well, what's one more cock, right?

Instead of another hard dick, however, he felt fingers pushing something against his gums. Something hard and bony. Wait, is the guy actually putting Steve's teeth back in? They'd knocked them out after Steve bit the first guy, and he'd been a drooling mess ever since.

This was followed by a gentle resetting of his bones and patching of his wounds. The guy clearly didn't have much to work with -- just some spare rags that felt suspiciously like the remnants of Steve's clothes that they'd cut off. But the Asset was clearly experienced with field medicine, even making a makeshift needle and thread from something.

Somewhere in the middle of that Steve must have relaxed enough to pass out, because the thing next thing he knew he was in a much colder place and some mushy food was being shoved into his mouth. With a tongue.

"Look at the freak, first it plays dress-up with the corpse, and now it's making out with it." There was the sound of someone batting a baton against metal bars of a cage, as if taunting an animal at the zoo. If Steve wasn't so incapacitated he'd be punching the source of the voice. The Asset's the only guy who's shown any semblance of humanity in this place, and he was being kept in a cell and being called a freak and an 'it'?

But all he could do is wiggle his tongue, and the Asset took it as opportunity to deepen the kiss and shove more food down his throat. Right. If he wants to punch anyone, he has to heal first.

Even with his enhanced healing, Steve was still pretty much a rag doll over the next few days. Which meant that he was completely subject to the Asset's strange ministrations. When the Asset was in his cell he never took his hands off of Steve. He'd sit Steve in his lap, or cradle Steve's head and pat his shoulder and fix his hair. He'd fuss with Steve's clothes, or at least whatever he'd salvaged to drape on Steve, and lick the pus from Steve's wounds. Once, after he licked the dried blood from Steve's eyelids, he added a few tentative kisses. And when the Asset laid down to rest on the cold concrete, he'd tuck Steve against him, pillowing Steve's head on his left arm, which was definitely metal. But odd as he was, the Asset was always gentle. Steve itched to move, or at least that his eyes would heal enough that he could see this strange, silent man.

He only put Steve down when he was summoned by the others. They'd open the cell door and say either, "We need the Fist" or "We need the Hound", and he'd leave, as silent as he's always been. It took Steve a couple of iterations to figure it out: when they needed the Fist, the guy came back smelling like blood and gunpowder. When they needed the Hound, he'd come back smelling like blood and semen.

The more he sussed out about the Asset, the more confused Steve got. Just who was this man? Patience. His eyes were already starting to itch, and he could feel his limbs starting to knit together. Soon he'll be able to see. Soon he'll be able to fight.

When his jaw healed, he tried to thank the guy. But he'd barely gotten half a sound out before he felt strong fingers pressing his lips and eyelids closed, and the metal hand at his throat. Moments later he heard footsteps approaching. Steve got the message: he's only alive because they think he's dead. And for whatever reason, the Asset wanted to keep it that way.

"Hey, Asset." There was a loud clanging as the Voice of Beard Guy struck his stun baton against the metal bars. "You're due to be iced in a coupla hours. Enough playing with Cap's corpse, toss him."

And with that, Steve felt himself heaved onto the Asset's shoulders and carried out. Two lefts, one right, some stairs, and another right, and then a blast of fresh air: salty breeze and the sound of waves striking rock. Before Steve could muster his muscles to strike out, he was airborne. He cracked his eyes open enough to see on the cliffside that was now 20 feet away: long hair, metal arm, already turning back towards the compound, followed by 4 men with guns out. 

And then Steve was plummeting. He'd been tossed clear of the rocks, so there was nothing but the deep blue of waters below. Steve's jaw worked enough to muser a smile: he was very good at diving without a parachute.

\----------------

Eighteen months later, when the metal arm flashed out to catch his shield -- well, finally: a chance to meet the Asset. And maybe a chance to repay him for his kindness.


	2. Epilogue of sorts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> For all the people who left questions to this oneshot fill: here's some mopey Steve. ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

A kid with a dog finds him on the beach. The press finds him in the hospital. Ugh. It's hard not to punch a wall, but it's a hospital so Steve doesn't. After the Chitauri incident last year he'd returned his shield, got a place in Brooklyn, grew a beard, and even signed up for art classes. And it was working. So much so that he let his guard down, and now... well, it figured-- he never could get the attention he wanted. Always either drought or flood.

The headlines run "Captain America Kidnapped!" and "Vacation Chills Captain America to the Bone" and "Forget Aliens, Beware the Beach." By the time he's released from the hospital it had blown out of control: if this can happen to Captain America, then no one is safe.

On the talk shows he tries to say: This was a freak thing. And: Attention makes it worse. And: What does one brush with death matter when there's people dying from everyday injustices. But no one was listening -- the scars on his arms were too fresh to ignore. 

And then the President gets kidnapped by the Mandarin. 

So he calls up Nick Fury. "I think you need me." 

On the other end of the phone Fury says, "Get the fuck down to DC, now."

\-----

He takes back the shield. He moves to DC, to calm the nation. He takes on missions, hoping to run into those goons again. He asks for a team, so that there'll be back-up next time. He sleeps with his shield by his bed, to fend off the nightmares.

It doesn't work. 

Some nights, he'd wake up in the dark, panicked that his eyes weren't going to heal, that he was just going to be incapacitated forever. Other nights, it was the feeling of *them*, in every pore, probing, cutting, fucking. Still other nights it was the ice, the water seeping into the Valkyrie, the slow chill. Or the scream of Bucky as he fell out of sight. And tonight it's all of it: he can't move, can't see, slowly freezing, and they're just laughing and touching and he...

punches a hole in the wall. Again. Swear to God most of his military backpay is going into fixing the damn wall. 

He doesn't run at night anymore, so he picks up his notebook. Not the sketching pencil, though -- whatever he draws now is bound to turn into more nightmare fuel.

Which is why, at 3am, he finds himself making lists.

List of errands. Names of his team at SHIELD. List of movies to watch. Foods from his childhood that are no longer available. List of Senators to speak to about the latest atrocity they're trying to pass. Names of the chorus girls from the spangle circuit. List of food items that don't contain corn syrup. List of all the injuries they inflicted on him, in chronological order. And then in order of severity. List of things he could have done to fight back. He puts his pen down. The serum made his memory too good, and at 3am, there's nothing in his brain except the nibbling nightmares. 

He goes online to look for advice about insomnia, which leads to articles about trauma, and a gif of a "calming cat." 

After staring at the cat for some time, Steve tries one of the suggestions to make a list of positive, non-threatening things from his encounter.

It turns into a list about the Asset.

The gentle touches, always tentative and soothing. The way the Asset quietly kept him fed and clean, sharing what little he had. The protective encircling of the Asset's arm around him, his bare chest pressed into his back. Bucky used to do that, especially when Steve was too wound up to go to sleep by himself. 

Bucky. Well, at least *this* particular hollow feeling in his chest is familiar.

He does *not* make a list of all the ways that he misses Bucky and their easy shared intimacy. Instead, he starts a list of all the things he knew about the Asset.

\- Judging by the way he held him, the Asset was roughly Steve's height.  
\- Left arm is metal, but moves like a normal arm (Does Stark know about this?)  
\- Long-ish hair, but definitely male.  
\- Strong -- could easily carry his weight  
\- Silent -- moves silently. Also: does not speak.  
\- Kept in a cell with no bedding and no water.  
\- Regularly demeaned, but does not react to it.  
\- Addressed as "the Asset" and "it"  
\- Two primary roles: "the Fist" and "the Hound"  
\- As the Fist: kills people (house assassin?)  
\- As the Hound: has sex with people.

Steve pauses. Chews his pen. Was it consensual? The three times that the Asset got summoned to be the Hound, was he being raped? Or did the Asset want it? Was it part of his job? When the Depression hit, Steve knew a couple folks who did that to make ends meet. (Well, you ended up on the docks for one reason or the other.)

But if it was part of the Asset's job, why did they keep the Asset in a cell as one would a prisoner? On the other hand, if the Asset didn't want it, why did he comply without protest? Was he being held at gunpoint? Was he killing under duress? Did he have family that he was trying to protect?

Steve flips between the two lists. The first is full of certainty to the Asset's kindness. The second is full of mystery about the Asset's condition. 

If the Asset was there under duress, then he had it much worse than Steve. What's one near-death rape and torture experience compared to being continually gang-raped and forced to kill for those bastards? He thinks back to the Asset's silence. How many iterations did it take for someone to stop reacting to these indignities and atrocities? 

Steve reads the first list again. Would he have mustered the same acts of kindness in that situation? He can stand his ground against an enemy, sure. Even give up his life if it's the best option. But... to survive with humanity intact -- this is asking for a whole different kind of strength. 

Steve flops back onto his bed, ignoring all the plaster bits from the hole in the wall. He'd like to meet the Asset. To see that quiet kind of strength up close. To thank him. To repay his kindness. (And maybe, to save him.)

Life feels better when there's a person to fight for.

He tucks the notebook under his pillow. Closes his eyes and remembers the Asset. A strong arm curled around him, protecting him from *them*, protecting him from nightmares.

Steve sleeps.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh man, I kept trying to work in a joke about it being a "blind date", because I think Steve would find it *hilarious* (and of course save it to use with Nat or Bucky, to whit:
> 
> Steve, responding to Nat trying to set him up: "Eeh, not that into blind dates since the last one left me with a gaping gut wound and a thing for a guy with a metal arm."
> 
> or Steve, to Bucky post-recovery: "You got me into so many horrible blind dates in the '30s, 's only proper that you got me *out* of one.")
> 
> Alas, it was not to be.
> 
> Also, I wanted to write a bit about how the WS cuddles makes Steve realize that he needs intimacy and cuddles in his life (hence: hitting on Sam and Sharon.) But alas, this bit turned out to be pretty Asset-focused. So, um... just imagine that his nightmares start to get better, and one day he wakes up wanting real cuddles. :)
> 
> ETA: Oh hey, I ended up writing a whole Steve/Bucky convo in one of the comments, so... I guess I did end up working in the dumb joke.

**Author's Note:**

> still nominally on [the tumblrs](http://thefilthiestpiglet.tumblr.com)


End file.
